cisely similar form, which has been engraved by Wilkinson, and is copied in Fig. 1. It is particularly curious, as showing how such sandals were held upon the feet, the thong which crosses the instep being connected with another passing over the top of the foot, and secured to the sole between the great toe and that next to it, so that the sole was held firmly, however the foot moved, and yet it allowed the sandal to be cast off at pleasure.

Wilkinson says that "shoes, or low boots, were also common in Egypt; but these are believed to have been of late date, and to have belonged to Greeks; for, since no persons are represented in the paintings wearing them, except foreigners, we may conclude they were not adopted by the Egyptians, at least in a Pharaonic age. They were of leather, generally of green color, laced in front by thongs, which passed through small loops on either side, and were principally used, as in Greece and Etruria, by women."

One of the close-laced shoes is given in Fig. 3, from a specimen in the British Museum; it embraces the foot closely, and has a thong or two over the instep for drawing it tightly over the foot, something like the half boot of the present day: the sole and upper leather are all in one piece, sewn up the back and down the front of the foot, a mode of construction practised in England as late as the fourteenth century.

The elegantly ornamented boot here given is copied from a Theban painting, and is worn by a

gayly-dressed youth from one of the countries bordering on Egypt: it reaches very high, and is a remarkable specimen of the taste for decoration, which thus early began to be displayed upon this article of apparel.

In Sacred Writ are many early notices of shoes : when Moses exhorts the Jews to obedience (Deut. xxix.), he exclaims, "Your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot." In the Book of Ruth (chap. iv.), we have a curious instance of the important part performed by the shoe in the ancient days of Israel, in sealing any important business: "Now this was the manner in former time in Israel, concerning redeeming, and concerning changing, for to confirm all things; a man plucked off his shoe, and gave it to his neighbor; and this was a testimony in Israel." Ruth, and all the property of three other persons, are given over to Boaz by the act of the next kinsman, who gives to him his shoe in the presence of witnesses.

The ancient law compelled the eldest brother, or nearest kinsman by her late husband's side, to marry a widow, if her husband died childless. The law of Moses provided an alternative, easy in itself, but attended with some degree of ignominy. The woman was, in public court, to take off his shoe, spit before his face, saying, "So shall it be done unto that man that will not build up his brother's house;" and probably the fact of this refusal was stated in the genealogical registers in connection with his name, which is probably what is meant by his "name shall be called in Israel, the house of him that hath his shoe loosed." (Deut. xxv.)

The editor of "Knight's Pictorial Bible," who notices these curious laws, also adds that the use of the shoe in the transactions with Boaz are perfectly intelligible; the taking off the shoe denoting the relinquishment of the right and the dissolution of the obligation in the one instance, and its transfer in the other. The shoe is regarded as constituting possession, nor is this idea unknown to ourselves, it being conveyed in the homely proverbial expression by which one man is said to "stand in the shoes of another;" and the vulgar idea "of throwing an old shoe after you for luck," is typical of a wish that temporal gifts or good fortune may follow you. The author last quoted says that, even at the present time, the use of the shoe, as a token of right or occupancy, may be traced very extensively in the East; and, however various and dissimilar the instances may seem at first view, the leading idea may be still detected in all. Thus among the Bedouins, when a man permits his cousin to marry another, or when a husband divorces his runaway wife, he usually says, "She was my slipper, I have cast her off.” (Burckhardt's "Bedouins," p. 65.) Sir F. Henniker, in speaking of the difficulty he had in persuading the natives to descend into the crocodile mummy pits, in consequence of some men having lost their lives there, says, "Our guides, as if preparing for certain death, took leave of their children; the father took the turban from his own head, and put it upon that of his son; or put him in his place, by giving him his shoes, a dead man's shoes.'" In Western Asia, slippers left at the door of an apartment denote that the master or mistress is engaged, and no one ventures on intrusion, not even a husband, though the apartment be his wife's. Messrs. Tyerman and Bennet, speaking of the termagants of Benares, say, " If domestic or other business calls off one of the combatants before the affair is duly settled, she coolly thrusts her shoe beneath her basket, and leaves both upon the spot, to signify that she is not satisfied:" meaning to denote, by leaving her shoe, that she kept possession of the ground and the argument during her unavoidable absence.

From all these instances it would appear that this employment of the shoe may, in some respects, be considered analogous to that which prevailed in the

Middle Ages, of giving a glove as a token of investiture when bestowing lands and dignities.

It should be observed that the same Hebrew word (naal) signifies both a sandal and a shoe, although always rendered shoe in our translation of the Old Testament. Although the shoe is mentioned in Genesis and other books of the Bible, little concerning its form or manufacture can be gleaned. That it was an article of common use among the ancient Israelites, we may infer from the passage in Genesis, chap. xiv. 23, the first mention we have of this article, where Abraham makes oath to the King of Sodom "that he will not take from a thread even to a shoe-latchet," thus assuming its common character.

The Gibeonites (Joshua ix. 5-13) came with old shoes and clouted (mended) upon their feet," the better to practise their deceit, and therefore they said, "Our shoes are become old by reason of the very long journey."

Isaiah "walked three years naked and barefoot:" he went for this long period without shoes, contrary to the custom of the people, and as "a wonder unto Egypt and Ethiopia."

That it became an article of refinement and luxury is evident from the many other notices given, and the Jewish ladies seem to have been very par ticular about their sandals: thus, we are told in the Apocryphal book of Judith, although Holofernes was attracted by the general richness of her dress and personal ornaments, yet it was "her sandals ravished his eyes;" and the bride in Solomon's Song is met with the exclamation, "How beautiful are thy feet with sandals, O prince's daughter!"

The ancient bas-reliefs at Persepolis, and the neighborhood of Babylon, second only in their antiquity and interest to those of Egypt, furnish us with examples of the boots and shoes of the Persian kings, their nobles, and attendants; and they were executed, as appears from historical as well as internal evidence, in the days of Xerxes and Darius. From these sources we here select three speciFig. 1.

who has charge of a chariot, upon a bas-relief now in the British Museum, brought from Persepolis by Sir R. Ker Porter, by whom it was first engraved and described in his interesting volumes of travels in that district. Fig. 2, also from Persepolis, and engraved in the work just quoted, delineates another kind of boot or high shoe, reaching only to the ankle, round which it is secured by a band, and tied in front in a knot, the two ends of the band hanging beneath it; this shoe is very common upon the feet of these figures, and is generally worn by soldiers or the upper classes; the attendants or councillors round the throne of these early sovereigns frequently wear such shoes. Fig. 3, seen upon the feet of personages in the same rank of life, is here copied from a Persepolitan bas-relief representing a soldier in full costume; it is a remarkably interesting example, as it very clearly shows the transition state of this article of dress, being something between a shoe and a sandal: in fact, a shoe may be considered as a covered sandal, and in the instance before us, the part we now term upper leather" consists of little more than the lacings of the sandals rendered much broader than usual, and fastened by buttons along the top of the foot; the shoe is thus rendered peculiarly flexible, as the openings over the instep allow of the freest movement. Such were the forms of the earliest shoes.

66

Close boots reaching nearly to the knee, where they are met by a wide trowser, are not uncommon upon these sculptures, being precisely the same in shape and appearance as those worn by the modern Cossacks. Indeed, there is nothing in the way of boots that may not be found upon the existing monuments of early nations, precisely resembling the modern ones. The little figure here given might

Fig. 2.

Fig. 3.

mens: Fig. 1 is a half-boot, reaching considerably above the ankle, and it is worn by the attendant VOL. XLV.-7

pass for a copy of boots worn by one of the soldiers of King William the Third's army, and would not be unworthy of Uncle Toby himself, yet it is carefully copied from a most ancient specimen of Etruscan sculpture in the possession of Inghirami, who has engraved it in his learned work, the "Monumenti Etruschi:" the original represents an augur or priest, whose chief duty was to report and explain supernatural signs.

PART I.

THERE is something in the character of Ehlenschlager and of his writings so simply and purely healthful, in a temperament so alive to the poetry of life, an organization so serene and happy, and a result so equable and uniform, that we are curious to know under what circumstances the true and honest nature of the poet was preserved through a long life, free from all bitter and unhealthful mixtures. He seems to unite with the warmth, the sunny light, the spontaneous vivacity of the south, the steady sustained calmness and reserved ideality of the north. Like his own Antonio,

"Nature in him is kind;

The kindling fire not merely warms, but burns;
Yet passion never with the vulture's claw
Seizes upon him."

Though born in poverty, the circumstances of his life were, for such a nature, most happy. His father, organist and steward of the royal castle of Fredericksburg, in a suburb of Copenhagen, seems to have possessed the same easy and serene disposition as his son; and to have been a most kind and indulgent parent, leaving the gentle boy to unfold his character without severe control, or a too childish indulgence. But it was from his mother, as he tells us, that his genius was inherited. She was a German, of refined nature, and delicately nurtured. He says, "I resembled her in character, and in person also. For the earnestness and melancholy in my character I have to thank her, and my father for my healthy organization and cheerful disposition. My mother possessed both sensibility and imagination; the tragical that I have been able to embody I derived from her; but, alas! I brought no laurel wreath to divide with her; those I gathered were laid upon her grave.

"In my second year, I was sleeping, one night, by my father's side, when I was awakened by a great tumult in the house. My father opened the window, and I saw the old familiar stork soaring away over the trees. In the morning, I went into my mother's chamber, and found the little puppet the stork had left in the night lying in the bed by my mother's side." This was his only sister, Sophia Wilhelmina Bertha; according to the tradition of Danish children, brought as a choice blessing by that sacred domestic guardian, the stork.

The circumstances of Ehlenschlager's childhood were favorable to his poetical development. He was

born in a small house, just at the entrance of the splendid avenue of beech-trees leading to the royal castle of which his father was the steward. This royal residence was filled with pictures, statues, and the choicest works of art. Opposite was Suderfield, which had been converted into a beautiful English park. "Our mode of life," he says, "differed in summer and in winter, as much as the seasons. In summer, the apartments were crowded with celebrated men, and beautiful, well-dressed women: the whole court was there. We children could look through the door and see the whole royal family sitting at the table, while the loveliest music was playing within. Every Sunday evening there was Turkish music in the gardens, and the people could walk therein. The English park, on the contrary, was sacred to the royal guests, and was always still, retired, and solitary. My father kept the key, and my sister and myself were allowed to wander within the shadow of its noble trees." Late in the autumn, the whole royal family removed to the city. There was no longer music and feasting, but carpenters, painters, and decorators, from whom the future poet and artist learned more, perhaps, than from the high-born and well-dressed guests. The actual northern winter came, and the castle was to the steward's family a complete hermitage, with two dogs and two sentinels, sheltered, like them, within its heavy walls. In storms, in rain and snow, the father sat in his blouse, with the smallest dog at his side, and read aloud to his family. They followed Albert Julius and Robinson Crusoe to their islands; roved in fairy-land with Aladdin and his lamp; or laughed at Don Quixote and Holberg's comedies.

In this desultory, independent manner of life, Ehlenschlager reached his twelfth year, having, as he says, learnt nothing; but the reader feels that these years, passed in the midst of an extensive park, surrounded by works of art, accompanied by inspiring music, could never have been lost upon a poetical organization like his.

Ehlenschlager's passion for the stage began to display itself in his twelfth year. He began to write comedies, and with the aid of his sister and a young friend of his own age, performed them to their own and the satisfaction of their older friends. His father intended to educate him for a merchant; but the gentleman in whose counting-house he was to have been placed, not being able just then to receive him, the plan was abandoned, and his father, with his usual good nature, consented that he should try his fortune upon the stage. After a sufficient

time spent with the dancing, the fencing, and the posture-master, (his mental preparation had been going on almost from his birth, for almost his whole study had been the drama,) and he had submitted to the discipline of the barber, also to that of the delicate shoe and glove-maker, he made his first appearance upon a public stage. His father went secretly into the theatre; but his mother and sister remained at home as long as the tender mother's anxiety would permit: notwithstanding the winter evening was cold and dark, she could not preserve her self-possession, and remain coldly absent. At the moment the piece was to begin, she went to the lobby of the theatre, and wept and prayed for her son. The sentinel's wife, who misunderstood her emotion, said, "Ah! madam, do not weep; perhaps he may yet be converted." His mother lived to witness his conversion from that devotion to the life of an actor, which, no doubt, secretly made one of the petitions of that mother's heart, on this evening of her prayer.

His success as an actor was only moderate; he soon found out, also, that, to see the rainbow and the beautiful halo of the planets, one must not be in the mist or rain-drops of which they are formed, but observe them from a far different point of view.

In the two years that Ehlenschlager spent on the boards, he gained much knowledge of life, and acquired many valuable acquaintances among amateurs and artists. He formed at this time a friendship with Rahbek, the Danish poet, whose wife was both spirituelle and accomplished; also a close intimacy with two brothers by the name of Ersted; students, the one of law, the other of medicine, both lovers of poetry. These brothers were, like twins, always together. They were peculiar also, and remind one, in some degree, of the brothers Cheeryble. They lived for each other's friendship; went about in winter in great overcoats, that also served for dressing-gowns, and leaned, like the Siamese twins, on each other. But these Dioscuri shone in genius like stars, and what was beneath their heavy overcoats could not long remain concealed. In their classes in the college, they took both honors and prizes. Under the auspices of these brothers, Ehlenschlager was admitted to hear the lectures, then highly valuable, in the college of Copenhagen. He says, "When I entered the halls, it seemed as though the old books in parchment, and the new in modern bindings, looked reproachfully at me, and asked, 'Wherefore have you left us?' I thought to myself, what can this mean?" He was already tired of the drudgery of the stage, although his passion for the drama was not abated, and therefore he understood the silent reproach of the books. He felt, also, that there was danger of his falling into the dissipated levity of the life of an actor; at least, of those whose whole time is not absorbed by taking the first rank as histrionic artists.

Influenced by the advice of the Ersteds, Ehlen

schlager left the stage, and entered upon a course of study to prepare himself for an examination, in order to enter the law classes of the university. He spoke with his father, who, as usual, left him to follow his inclination. "I was now again," he says, "in heaven." In the intervals of study, he could plan his tragedies, and write them out upon the days when there was no lecture. In the hours of study, also, the dry folios of the law were often neglected for the charms of Horace and Virgil.

His life had now become more earnest; he had a goal before him, that of becoming a lawyer, and of taking his place among his fellow-men as an advocate. By joining the law school, he was introduced to the literary clubs of young students, that seem, in Copenhagen, to be societies that really love letters and each other. The kindest and most honorable and elevated tone of feeling prevails. The young men call each other thou, and with a spirit of freedom and equality swear to each other brotherhood while belonging to the same club, although in the world they are separated by a wide difference in rank and in worldly circumstances.

These literary brotherhoods of young students admit them to a species of happiness which belongs to the male sex, and to the elect only among them, and in the period of youthful enthusiasm. Women have not yet formed such pure and devout attachment to literature and the arts as to form societies among themselves for their own culture and for devotion to the arts. Many reasons might be given for and some against such combinations, but this is not the place to discuss them.

Here Ehlenschlager became acquainted (in their own language) with the works of those shining stars in the literature of Germany, Herder, Goethe, and Schiller, and corrected the false taste which had led him to prefer Kotzebue's tragedies, Schiller's "Robbers," and Goethe's first works, to the more manly literature of their later writings. "The Sorrows of Werter," he says, retained always the power over him that it first exerted upon his imagination. The preferences and tastes ripened by years must have slumbered in the bud of childhood; but many of the illusions and superstitions of youth remain, even after years have unfolded the power of art, and knowledge has chased away the shadows of ignorance. "Happy are those," he says, "who can eat of the tree of knowledge, without being hunted from the paradise of innocence and nature."

Before Ehlenschlager had finished his law studies, he had the grief to lose his mother; that fond mother that he so much resembled in mind and person; the only friend to whom he had imparted his early efforts at poetry and literary composition, over which she rejoiced with the proud tenderness of a mother, but anticipated not his future success. He says, "I saw those eyes, so like my own, become dim with the approach of death; I felt those hands, that had ever been busied in the service of others,

become cold and lifeless. Thus she slept. My father closed her eyes, and we followed to place the loved form in the Gods-field, where I also wish, hereafter, to rest." Sorrow could not remain long an inmate of a heart so light; it could not long intrude upon his buoyant spirits; he says his happy temperament soon drew him from the shadow to the sunshine of life.

After the death of this tender mother, the fireside of his home was less attractive, but the loss was soon alleviated through the influence of her who was to be his future wife, Christiana, the daughter of Counsellor Heger. The poet Rahbek had married a sister, and thus introduced him to the family. Although there is a very inconvenient absence of dates in this autobiography of the poet, he was at this time apparently about twenty years old. He had, as yet, published nothing; his prospects could not have been very flattering. His studies were not yet finished, and only in his profession of the law could he hope for success sufficient to allow him to marry. He thus describes the lady to whom he ventured to offer all he possessed-a true and honest heart:

"She was a beautiful girl of seventeen, well formed, and full of energy. Her eyes were large and blue, her complexion snow-white, with a delicate rose in her cheeks. Nature had been so bountiful to her in hair that, when she suffered the beautiful blonde tresses to fall down, they formed a complete veil to her person. She, like all the Heger family, was accomplished and witty. The first time I saw her she was weaving a wreath of corn flowers, as blue as her own eyes. The crown is still mine; and although the leaves have fallen out, they still retain the deep blue of her eyes. It was after a lonely afternoon walk, that I entered the counsellor's house with Rahbek, the poet, son-in-law of the family. The beautiful girl sat industriously at her needle, and when she raised her head at my entrance, I thought I read a certain pleasure in her eyes. An animated conversation ensued, afterwards a good supper with good wine. Christiana was full of wit and humor."

For the want of a better word, I must translate Christiana's peculiar humor by the word quizzing. She was instantly alive to everything peculiar in the character or appearance of her friends, and with ready wit placed the peculiarity before them. Like all the Heger family, she possessed the talent of imitating the voice and manner of others, and gave to all her acquaintances pet names, indicating their peculiarities. For this species of wit, Ehlenschlager gave her the name of the Anabaptist.

After the delightful evening mentioned above, encouraged, we presume, by the glance of her blue eyes, the poet says he followed Christiana wherever she went to walk by star or moonlight. In these heavenly but embarrassing walks, the Anabaptist lost her inclination to quiz her companion. He says,

"We went silently, arm in arm; I was one-syllabled, embarrassed, and very serious-Christiana also. At last love, that had so long robbed me of courage, gave it to me, and I came out stuttering with my timid declaration." Christiana, the joker, seems to have been well prepared for it. He says, "She understood my metaphors and aphorisms right well, and she did not leave me in despair." He was permitted to speak to her father.

This father was an extraordinary man; an easy man for the serious affairs of life. Before the bombardment of Copenhagen, he was possessed of a large property. His beautiful house and splendid gardens were destroyed by that event. Although a lawyer and counsellor, he possessed many other talents. Our poet says he was a very good smith, joiner, and turner; an excellent horticulturist and ornamental gardener. His strawberries excelled those of the royal gardens. He sketched beautifully. Thorwaldsen, when in Copenhagen, spent his evenings at his house, sketching with him for the instruction of his daughters. He was an accomplished musician, and when alone with the piano phantazied so as to charm all who accidentally heard him. He ground glasses for telescopes, and wrote a treatise, in French, upon optics. He was familiar with the manufacture of the papier-maché, and made beautiful articles, particularly snuff-boxes, whereon he painted lovely landscapes. His works in this art, which he also taught his daughters, were celebrated and sought for in other countries. Being expert in making fireworks, he often amused his friends by such exhibitions; but a young servant having been accidentally injured by the fall of one of his rockets, he abandoned this art. He was a courtier, and had taken part in the Italian opera, upon the court theatre.

Ehlenschlager approached this man of universal talents with great anxiety and timidity. He made a humble speech, setting forth his own small merits, which consisted, like Othello's, only in this, that he had loved and wooed his daughter; that he had nothing but his love, and the prospect and promise of his friend; that in two years' time he should finish his studies, and then he hoped to begin to earn his living. The father listened politely, rang the bell, called for his daughter, said a few words in her ear, placed her hand in that of her lover, and-changed the subject-whereby, says Ehlenschlager, "he did me a great service." This transaction speaks well for the merit of Ehlenschlager, or we must presume that, if the father treated every subject as summarily as that of his daughter's happiness, his various accomplishments are not so wonderful.

Ehlenschlager now studied his profession with more determined industry, but he could not resist the invitations of the muses. He was continually making hasty excursions to Parnassus, and indeed loitering there. At this time he wrote for the aca

* Improvised.